The Influence of Self-Efficacy, Gender Stereotypes and the Importance of It Skills on College Students’ Intentions to Pursue IT Careers

Diversity-related themes such as social inclusion, community informatics, and broadening participation in undergraduate and graduate education are consistently discussed at the i-Conference. In this paper, the authors examine three factors (self-efficacy, gender stereotypes about IT skills, and the importance of IT skills) which are critical in shaping career choices of the iSchool undergraduate population. To further our understanding of human diversity, we seek to determine if there is variation in these three factors by race/ethnicity. The findings suggest that students across racial and ethnic backgrounds are similar in their beliefs about job skills required for IT careers as well as their ability to acquire and perform these skills. However, students seem to be more confident in their non-technical skills and place highest importance on human skills. Information science undergraduate programs may, therefore, need to place greater emphasis on the transfer of technical skills and educate students about the importance of these skills in the workplace.